Breathless
by Saf Dawnheart
Summary: So many things steal the sustenance from his lungs around her. And he knows he loves her too much to feel annoyed about it. — Riku/Kairi.


Hey all! I honestly can't believe I hadn't written anything for these two sooner, because they're quite possibly my KH OTP (right up there with SoNami and VaniVen, lol). At any rate, this ended up being a lot angstier than I intended, which makes sense, considering the nature of the pairing; however, I'd like to think I recovered a bit by the end.

Enjoy!

**_Disclaimer-_** I do not own Kingdom Hearts, nor do I own the song "Breathless," from which this fic gains it inspiration. (I listened to the Taylor Swift cover of that song... you can all pelt me with rocks now.)

* * *

><p>It's odd, how being in the place he once despised as his prison now feels so achingly like home.<p>

Riku leans against the paopu tree overlooking the ocean, the very thing that has served as a haven for him and his friends in the past, in the same position he always adopted in the past: arms folded, staring calmly out at the sea, watching the sun become little more than a golden thread lining the horizon. Again, his thoughts wander to how strange this feels: instead of eyeing that thread with envy and longing, only comfort and happiness suffuse him; instead of shifting irritably against the bark of the tree digging into his back, he finds herself relishing the feeling.

Or maybe that could just be his outfit change making him less itchy. He's not quite sure.

Either way, though, he knows that after everything he and Sora and Kairi have gone through, Destiny Island feels more like home than his bitter fifteen-year-old self had thought.

_Sora and Kairi._ As it turns out, that's the worst possible road for his mind to follow, as it makes the almost-maybe-smile (such a rarity for him at all, a sight that, ironically, only the presence of his two best friends can bring out) fade at once.

_Don't,_ he tells himself immediately, trying to push down the feelings that rise up inside him at thinking of Sora and Kairi's relationship. Sorrow and jealousy and anger all rolled into one nauseating, self-deprecating wave in his stomach. _You told Sora to take care of her, remember? You gave them your blessing, even though they shouldn't have needed it._

The reminders are so well-worn into his mind that they're almost like a mantra, except they have the opposite effect on his emotions, only amplifying their negativity instead of reversing them.

He supposes he should have known something would happen, after the way Kairi had rushed into Sora's embrace in the World That Never Was. After Sora had stiffened in shock, only to relax and allow his arms to wrap around her. After Riku, swathed in the guise of Xehanort's Heartless, had looked on, feeling imaginary talons squeeze his heart in his chest, unable to stop the traitorous thoughts _it should be me in her arms right now._

He's not the jealous type. He knows that much, he thinks to himself, unable to keep a hint of bitterness from oozing into his heart. The sea breeze kicks up then, almost as if reinforcing the gloom in his thoughts (again, uncharacteristic for him, because in the past even the slightest hint of self-deprecation was tempered by sarcasm and dryness), and he closes his eyes, hoping to find at least a hint of solace in the way it pushes back his long, silvery hair.

Not surprisingly, it doesn't come, and he has no idea why he thought it would.

Riku groans aloud, and brings up one hand to press his thumb and index finger over the bridge of his nose. All of a sudden, the edge of sunlight remaining seems all too blinding, searing his retina in a way that normally only the high noon island sun manages to accomplish.

_I should probably go back home,_ he thinks. Gods only knew if his dad caught him out here after dark… Riku fights back a grimace at the mental image of his father's worry. He understands it, yes; even after darkness had swallowed up Destiny Island, however briefly (and he doesn't dare think of who exactly called that darkness), the residents still retained trace memories of what had happened. As a result, even now, Sora's parents and the mayor still never let Sora and Kairi wander for too long after the sun went down.

Even as Riku turns on his heel, though, he catches sight of maroon hair fluttering in the wind, of pink fabric flashing in the dying sun. And Riku's breath catches in his throat as he spots the source of his inner conflict – the reason why he's torn between annoyance and affection, jealousy and happiness, anger and calm – approaching him at a run from the dock.

"Riku!" Kairi calls, even though at this point he can hear her all too well.

He blinks as she grows closer and he catches sight of her wide, violet eyes. Trying to keep his barely-exercised romantic side from rhapsodizing about those eyes, he simply raises an eyebrow, bemused at the urgent expression on her face. "Hey, Kairi," he greets, and it's a testament to his self-control that he sounds so collected.

His eyes widen as she comes to an unsteady halt in front of him, leaning over and bracing her hands against her knees to try and overcome her breathlessness. "What's wrong?" he asks, genuinely concerned.

At that particular moment Kairi catches her breath, raising her head and giving him an expectant look. "I have something to show you," she explains, still panting a little.

"Uh, all right." But he barely has time to get even that much out before she's lunging forward, exhaustion completely wiped from her countenance and leaving only a scant bit of sweat on her forehead as the remnants of her run, and seizing his wrist to drag him away from the coastline.

Pathetically enough, he can only stare down at her fingers wrapped around his wrist, even as she silently pulls him along behind her and the surface beneath their shoes changes from smooth wood to sunbaked sand. Not for the first time in the last ten years, he almost curses this girl for making him fall so hard for her, but can't quite get that far in thinking negatively about her.

Which, again, reinforces just how deeply he's fallen for her.

He surfaces from his contemplation long enough to experience a jolt of surprise as Kairi suddenly, sharply, veers to the side, away from the forest at the edge of the coastline. Their play island doesn't have the urban setting of the mainland, which is, really, just the way Riku has always liked it.

But now they're coming upon a clearing filled with decidedly man-made equipment, and Riku draws in a breath as nostalgia floods over him with all the bittersweet tenderness the emotion is known for. Everything here still looks the same: the blanket of leaves coating the ground, assisted by autumn coming over Destiny Island; the bent tree that always served as the perfect hiding spot during hide-and-seek; the thin layer of rust that's always covered the swing set's top bar; even the way the bench next to all the playground equipment tilts just a little to the right, kept like that after all this time.

After ten years of fighting and talking and growing up.

"I still can't believe I found this place," Kairi says, laughing and slipping her fingers off his arm, leaving distinctively icy trails in her wake. He watches her take a few steps toward the swing set, arms locked together behind her back. "It's been so long since the three of us were all together here."

_The three of us._ Riku swallows the bitterness that rises up in his throat at the thought of Sora (the boy who always, always gets everything, Keyblade to Kairi and everything in between) and pushes back the self-hatred that results at the notion of his own selfishness (_he's your best friend, quit being a jealous wreck already_).

"Where _is_ Sora today?" the silver-haired teen asks. It's a valid question; their close-knit bond aside, ever since Sora and Riku returned to the islands, the brunette and the redhead are always together.

Kairi shrugs, turning around to face him, and her face lights up so completely as she speaks – mentions the boy who _was never, isn't, will never be_ him – that Riku's heart twinges a tiny bit. Just a bit, though. "His mom had something she wanted him to help her with today."

"Ah." What he wants to say cannot contain itself within a simple comment – a further response that Kairi clearly expects, if the way she's fixed her eyes on him is any indication – and furthermore, he doesn't want it to. What he wants to say sounds something along the lines of _why didn't you wait until Sora got back to show me this?_

And yet no matter how badly he wants to make that question a reality, to physically assist its presence in his mind in becoming audible, he feels a nervous flutter inside him. Half out of anxiety, and half out of fear of what the answer is.

He gets just enough time to make a paltry attempt at dismissing these emotions – if running around in Xehanort's form has taught him anything, after all, it's that dwelling on fear and anxiety only lead to pain (but he's somehow dealt with it when it comes to her) – before Kairi's suddenly lurching forward again. Grabbing his arm, facilitating the return of the warm tendrils Riku hates admitting exists, and laughing when her action elicits a startled grunt from him.

"Oh, come on, Riku!" she grins. "It's a playground; you know, for playing?"

And just like that, she whisks him off to the very landmarks he noted upon arrival: playing in the leaves, creating an impromptu storm that frames Kairi's fluttering maroon hair and eager smile in a dancing tornado of red and yellow and gold; taking turns being the seeker for the most simplistic, inane game Riku knows, but whose flaws he can overcome (if only to see the triumph spread on Kairi's face when she finds his foot poking conspicuously out from behind the bent tree); chasing each other around and kicking up even more leaves.

All to the cadence of her laughter, and, eventually, his, once the iron gate around his heart loosens just a tad and allows his ability to have fun (it exists, really it does) to shine through.

(Hey – he's got to be a little bit like Sora at this point.)

Time goes by, as they regress to the age when Riku had first gazed out at the sea and wondered just where it ended. Sunset turns to twilight, and twilight turns to early evening, and soon the coating of rust on the swing set gleams bloody silver in the moonlight (not unlike Riku's hair had, that last deadly fight with Sora in Hollow Bastion, and he will not think about that right now because he's with Kairi and nothing else matters).

Even as Riku fights back his pride and just lets himself bask in the memories of better days, though, a sense of realization begins to work its way over him, until it hits him, with the force of a Keyblade to the stomach, why he feels that way. He's spent his whole life – until that fateful night the darkness had come, at least – looking at what was beyond the horizon instead of what was beside him, forsaking and taking home for granted instead of embracing it and his friends.

_This _is_ home,_ Riku realizes. _Here, and now, with her and Sora. How did I ever trick myself into thinking it wasn't?_

It was about more than trickery, though, when he gets down to it. It was wanderlust, and striving to break the cage binding his fluttering wings down. Most of all, though, it was the day Sora had rushed back from the play island's shores to breathlessly tell Riku what he had found washed up on the shore.

One maroon-haired little girl, who had eventually told them she had no idea where she had come from, who had planted the seed of curiosity and restlessness in Riku's heart.

It was never her fault all this happened, though. He could never blame her for something he had done.

The thought of Sora brings him up short, tugs him sharply, jarringly, back to the present: Kairi's energy has finally depleted enough that she needs a break, but contrary to what he would have thought, she plops down in one of the swings instead of at the crooked table. Riku stands awkwardly, suddenly at a loss of whether to take the initiative and sit down next to her or to take the bench.

Fortunately, though, Kairi spares him the trouble of deciding. She pushes a piece of windblown maroon hair out of her eyes without a trace of insecurity – a year spent apart from her boys has not robbed her of her disregard for vanity, it seems – and grins at him. "Had enough yet? This amount of fun too much for you?"

Despite her words, Riku smiles back at her playful undertone. "Of course not," he retorts.

"Then push me." She motions vaguely to the area behind her, and it takes Riku an embarrassingly long moment to realize she means the swing.

He narrows his eyes to cover up his humiliation, thankful that his bangs hide the crimson dusting his cheeks. "If I do that, then who's gonna push _me_ when I start swinging?"

Kairi waves a faux-dismissive hand. "Oh, you can push yourself. Please?" She drags out the last word and tilts her head, and just like that he forgets his embarrassment.

Riku groans, palms his forehead. When she gives him that wide-eyed, pleading look, he doesn't stand a chance. "Oh, fine," he gives an exaggerated sigh, and fakes an overly resigned trudge to behind her.

Once he's got her going – trying not to giggle like an infatuated schoolgirl at the happy squeals every ascent induces from Kairi – he hops on the swing next to her. Just as she said, it doesn't take him long to match her pace, the swing chains creaking precariously with every move, his deep-voiced chuckles contrasting with hers as he chases her to the emerging stars and back again.

It's like the last year and a half all over again, really.

A few minutes later – or hours, or maybe days; he's not exactly sure, clichéd as it sounds – Kairi touches down first. It's a clumsy process at first, one that involves the well-scraped furrows created by children's stabilizing feet becoming deeper and rubbing off more dirt onto her shoes, but eventually she slows her momentum and comes to a stop. Just like before, Riku has a stupidly long lag period before noticing, and quickly does the same, panic fluttering briefly within his heart at his haste before he, too, is still once again.

Kairi turns her head to look at him, hooking her wrists around the chains binding the swing to the bar, and the grin on her face is so unbearably beautiful he has to remind himself to whom she belongs. _Sora, Sora, not you, you told him as much, remember?_

The argument, so stable a reality check before, sounds half-hearted now due to the lack of spiky-haired boy alongside them.

"I haven't been here in so long," she sighs, her eyes slipping closed.

"Me neither," Riku admits. After they had begun construction on their raft – after, really, his insistence on wanting to see the world outside became too much for Sora and Kairi – they hadn't come back to the playground. And it wasn't like spending their time spent bathed in darkness and light and longing had given the trio much time for trivialities like this.

She opens her eyes then and turns them on him. "Well, I figured as much for you, Riku," she confesses. Hesitates – Riku balks at the anomaly for her and nearly asks what's wrong, but she beats him to speaking. "Really, though, after everything we've been through… I figured you deserved a day of fun."

_Everything. _One word – three syllables, rolling so easily off the tongue, but in Riku's mind it carries so much weight and pain that it might as well be something much more complicated. For all intents and purposes, it _is._

When she refers to him specifically, the sympathy her gaze attains makes her meaning all too obvious. The vaguely haunted gleam to that emotion makes a tongue of fiery guilt lash over Riku's heart. That kind of pity on any other person but Kairi or Sora would induce anger from Riku – a refusal of any sort of empathy.

Dyed in violet now, though, that empathy gives him only a sense of weary obligation. To tell her exactly why she had pulled down the hood in the Altar of Naught to reveal not the fine silver hair and turquoise eyes of her best friend, but the coarse gray hair and amber eyes of Sora's greatest enemy. In Kairi's point of view, a complete stranger, whom she had only recognized by the way he held his blade.

He sighs, and just like that he brings himself back to the present. Everything's over now, he wants to think, but knows it would be a lie. Nothing's over. Nothing ever is. Especially when it comes to her.

"I took that form to save Sora," he says, every word catching on and pulling out imaginary thorns. Agonizing, but necessary. "It…" He pauses, wondering how to condense a year of worry and anxiety and not knowing anything about bringing Sora's memories back; eventually, he settles on the most simplistic explanation. "It was the only way."

"Why was it the only way?" Kairi asks immediately, leaning over to meet his eyes. He sighs inwardly. _Should've seen that coming. _"Riku, look at me. Why was it the only way?"

He lifts his head and obeys her. It's like looking directly into the sun, and only his self-restraint keeps him from taking refuge in the ground again.

Fortunately for him, though, Kairi takes it upon herself to continue and saves him the trouble of thinking how to explain this without mentioning having to fight Roxas. "I just don't understand any of this," she admits with a sigh, immediately defying her prior demand and staring at the furrows in the ground beneath her feet. "All I know is you and Sora were gone for a year, and I had to wait for you. The only reason I even met up with you in the first place was because that Axel creep kidnapped me."

Her voice grows more and more unsteady as she goes on, and Riku's eyes widen. Only now does it occur to him, the torture that she must have gone through. Missing one of her best friends – him – for a year, only to have that pain increase twofold when she had woken up one morning to find memories of Sora accompanying those of Riku.

_Of course, missing Sora must have been ten times worse than it was missing me,_ the thought skitters across Riku's consciousness before he can stop it, and reminds him why he could never be the best thing for her.

"I just…" Kairi breathes, rubs one hand over her eyes. "I missed you. You and Sora both."

The last part sounds a little tacked-on, and Riku blinks. This is such a far cry from the girl he knows – the girl who had charged up to him on the beach and had enough strength left to drag him here; the girl who always raced alongside him and Sora even though they usually left her far behind; the girl he had come to love so much despite her heart seeming to belong to someone else – it sends little pinpricks of warmth into the back of his eyes as well.

"Sorry," is all he can think to say, and immediately wants to smack himself for it. _That's all you can think of? Smooth move there._

She raises her head to look at him. The hand that had come up to rub her eyes had lingered, allowing her knuckle to brush against her cheekbone, so she lowers it now in response to his uncharacteristic apology. The glimmer normally surrounding those violet eyes has a trembling quality to it, and yet she laughs like nothing's amiss, like she's not about to let her repressed longing spill over in liquid form. "You're apologizing? Something's definitely wrong now."

Pathetic, that's what the nonchalant, blithe tone she tries to use is, and Riku knows it. Yet it only makes the simmering heat in his rarely-exercised tear ducts worse, only makes him want to crush her to him and tell her everything will be all right, that he and Sora are here to stay. That he, at the very least, won't leave her behind again.

"Nothing's wrong," he says, softly. "I mean it. I'm sorry we kept having to leave you behind." And then he hears someone say, in a voice almost as rent with pain as hers, "It's gonna be fine, so don't cry."

Oh. That had come from him, hadn't it?

Kairi must feel the same surprise that he had dared say even this much, for her eyes widen, loosing the floodgates long enough to facilitate the path of one tear down her cheek. "Riku…"

Riku takes a deep breath, tries to ease the pounding of his heart and dry the brimming of his eyes. Predictably, neither attempt works; his mind governing his actions tends to betray him that way, after all, no matter how much he wants to subdue it. And watching her now, seeing her eye him with tenderness and empathy on her now-tear-coated face, neither symptom ceases. The thought briefly, idiotically, darts across his mind _maybe Sora isn't the one she loves after all, maybe –_

Then his common sense wakes up and bats it firmly aside.

Strange, then, that this time, going through the reasons why Sora's much better for her doesn't work as well as it used to.

A flicker of movement from below catches his eye, and he can only watch, frozen, as she brings up the hand she had used to wipe her eyes and brushes her thumb against the hollow of his cheek. Lingers. Riku's breath hitches at the sensation of her bare skin; sputters within his throat before the roaring in his chest snuffs it out and he's left breathless. He feels her fingertips settle against the side of his neck, one nearly making contact with his fine silver hair.

As if in tandem to the breath she just stole from him, the wind kicks up, allowing the leaves their feet loosened up to swirl about in their gentle fingers. Maroon hair sweeps over violet eyes in response to the breeze, but in spite of that he can still see her face. Still see more tears accompany the lone droplet trekking steadily down her face. The way her mouth opens in bewilderment when his own eyes oblige to the sorrow seeing her cry brings him and one tear absorbs into the thumb still pressed to his cheek.

_This is it, right? _He could probably move to kiss her now. But he holds himself back. He's spent the majority of his life thinking she belongs to someone else, after all. And for the sake of comfort in familiarity, he almost wants to think he's wrong.

In the end, he settles on reaching out – with trembling fingers, nonetheless; in light of who exactly this is he only feels self-deprecation for all of about two seconds – for her. The moon casts a half light down on them, and as a result he barely saves himself from poking her leg in lieu of his true path. His pupils dart down to the ground as he twines his fingers with hers, carefully, gingerly, holding the breath he barely manages to dredge up from his hormone-exhausted lungs. She won't pull away; he knows her better than that, knows she would never do that to him. No, if anything, the let-him-down-gently route she'll likely take is almost worse.

So it surprises him, when she's the one who squeezes his hand instead of him. Uses the contact to pull herself closer to him. The chains on the swings scream in protest, but the wince that immediately builds up at the cacophony calms instantly when he feels her other hand drop from his face and slide to his chest instead.

They sit there for a few moments, during which he shivers at the tickle of her damp eyelashes against his bare collarbone and feels her lips quirk up a little in response to his nervousness. His heart's become a jackhammer in his chest, assisted by her proximity and the way he can pinpoint her scent every time it wafts into his nostrils. Strawberry.

And then Riku remembers Sora, and why longing will always temper his happiness for his two best friends, and the reminder crashes into his mind and splinters the haze of bliss surrounding him into bittersweet fragments.

The instant he makes a move to pull back, though, Kairi beats him to it. She lifts her head from his chest and looks up at him, with her palm still splayed against his black shirt and a quivering quality to her eyes. Clearly, she had the same thought, as anxiety now mars her countenance. Riku imagines she's probably thinking _what are you doing, Kairi, whose shoulder should you really be crying on? _and the breathlessness seizes him again, this time born of pain and not surprise.

Pain. Surprise. So many things steal the sustenance from his lungs around her. And he knows he loves her too much to feel annoyed about it.

"Sorry," Kairi says then, softly. Breathily. Confusion crosses Riku's mind at the genuine contrition in her voice, because really, he should apologize right now, not her.

Then it hits him, why she said that. Because she had initiated the hold with her fingers on his cheek, the fingers that now have fisted in his shirt, as though making sure he's still there. Making sure he's not going to go.

(_I won't,_ he wants to say.)

"Sorry?" he repeats instead, incredulously. Apparently the word came out sharper than he intended, because he feels the hand gripping his give a reflexive squeeze. "No, wait," he says hastily, tugging her close again. "I… don't be."

_Oh, very good, Riku, not pathetic at all. _But it's enough for Kairi, it seems. She gives a tentative smile of relief, and then releases his shirt long enough to knuckle her eyes again; the dark fabric falls in a bunched, wrinkled manner, and Riku makes no move to fix it.

"I took you here to have fun," she says at last. "To take your mind off things. And I end up making things worse."

Riku's eyes widen. "Making things worse?" Ignoring the fact that he now resembles a very tall, very lovesick parrot, he grasps the hand still hovering over her face, revealing the violet eyes that have dominated his world for the past ten years. "Kairi, I needed to get this out," he says, and realizes he speaks the truth. It's not just a petty attempt to stem her sorrow, to palliate her fears. It's a fact that has lurked inside him with all the feral destructive capabilities of Xehanort's Heartless, and much like after the eradication of said Heartless, he feels bereft.

(This time it didn't take a blast of light, but Kairi might as well be one.)

"I needed…" He hesitates, suddenly not knowing how to finish, because the most important, most complicating revelation of all lies heavy in his heart; will likely weigh it down until the end of time, because Sora and Kairi are supposed to be together until the end of time and Riku has no place getting in the way of that.

In light of tonight, though, the typical justifications seem as hollow and empty as the playground around them. Devoid of anything but the two of them.

He settles for "I needed to know everything would be all right, is all." Close enough to the truth.

Kairi nods in understanding, not trying to take her hands out of his. Just when he thinks that'll be the end of it – a notion that makes him both relieved and disappointed at once – she presses her head against his chest again and his heart lurches back into overdrive.

"Kairi, what…?" he tries.

"Oh, calm down, you big lug," she interrupts, a last attempt at playfulness in her words. Surprisingly, it succeeds in making Riku smile. As one, their hands settle, one pair wound by the wrist around the touching swing chains, and the other lying against Riku's leg. The breath that puffs steadily against Riku's collarbone feels fairly even now, not jagged or forced, and he allows himself to relax at the absence of her tears.

When she speaks next, shattering the silence that he's allowed to drape soft wings over them, he stares at her in surprise.

"Sora's not really out with his mom," she confesses.

Riku blinks. "Then why did you say he was?" In hindsight, he should have figured something was off when hours went by and Sora didn't come bouncing through the trees for them, demanding teasingly as to why they had gone here without him.

She shrugs, guilt obvious in the way she turns her head to stare at the ground, unbelievably soft tendrils of hair caressing his skin with the movement. "I thought… you'd take this a little better than he would."

"This…?" Riku likes to think he usually has situations under control – recent events notwithstanding, of course – but such a vague description bemuses him.

Huffing out a sigh, Kairi leans further against him. "The conversation we just had? All this hugging?" The next breath she utters issues significantly more quietly than the last, almost as if all the irritation escapes her with it, and her next words emerge so quietly he strains to hear them. "Comforting people?"

Riku draws his head back slightly, though considering the chain of the swing pushing against the back of his neck and Kairi's tight hold on him, it's a bit of a difficult feat. _Comfort. _He hadn't thought of it that objectively, but really, comfort is a fitting moniker for this.

And anyway, wasn't this what he had needed, too? Not necessarily a confirmation she felt the same way – he's not that delusional – but at least the knowledge that she trusted him enough to handle her emotions like this, fragile though they were.

(Yes, she's fragile: in spite of ten years spent with two boys, Riku knows her well enough to testify to that.)

Kairi jerks a little in surprise when Riku's chin settles against the top of her head, but soon relaxes. "Decided you need it, too?" she queries, glancing back from the glowing silver horizon and gazing into his eyes.

Riku just smiles, and after a moment, she does the same and ducks her head back down again.

The chains from the swings dig into his wrist, and the wind bites even more icily against his skin (tempered by her warmth as it is), and thinking of sneaking around Sora's back like this makes the loyal part of Riku's heart cringe.

But at the same time he knows that here – in a playground, on the swings, with Kairi and the sea breeze and the starlit sky – is home.

It always will be.

* * *

><p>Ahhh, gotta love corny endings. :)<p>

On a slightly unrelated note, this officially marks the last of the song-inspired oneshots I was working on (started with my VaniVen fic, and ended with this). Only took me nine months, lol. (Does that make the final product of all ten oneshots my child? o_O)

Review please!


End file.
